Free golf can be expensive

On Saturday I was scheduled to go play golf with a Brian, Joanna & Matt. Our tee time was for just after 7:00 am and the golf course was up in Summerlin which is a 30+ minute drive from my place. I knew I was going to have to get up early, but that didn’t stop me from going out to play poker on Saturday night. In a tourney with over 150 players, I finished in 2nd place. I got pretty unlucky to lose the final hand, but that, as they say, is poker. Still, I certainly wasn’t upset finishing 2nd. The only problem is, we didn’t get home until after 1 am. By the time my adreniline slowed, it was nearly 2 am before I got to sleep.

A few short hours later I got up and headed across town. I got there on time had plenty of time to hit a small bucket of balls before we started our round. When we went up to pay I recognized the guy behind the counter as a guy I used to play hockey with here in town. We chatted for a few minutes and then he handed us our receipt without taking any money. He was nice enough to comp us (Matt & I) both for our round. Way cool! Brian & Joanna showed up just in time for tee off. The day started nice, it wasn’t too hot (yet) and on the front 9, I played fairly well. I was pretty pleased with how things were going. Then came the back 9 and a totally different story…

I think it as the 10th hole. Perhaps the 11th. I hit my drive pretty well. It went down the left hand side and landed just off the fairway on a bit of a hill. I lined up for my second shot and was using my 3 iron. The ball was elevated a bit campared to my feet because of the hill. Since I’m a lefty, I’m facing the houses that line the left side of the course. I hit the ball clean and things look good… until it starts slicing left. Then it’s over a house. Then there is a thud. I don’t hear anything break, so that’s cool. I’ll just go up a ways, drop a new ball and continue on… We hop into the cart and start up the fairway and see 2 older people heading out on to the golf course from the house. We pull up and stop. The lady visibly shaken lady says, “You hit our window, can you please come up here.” I apologize several times as I walk up on to their patio and see the window I hit. The lady tells me that her and her husband were working on the patio when the ball wizzed about 1 foot over her head before hitting the window. It was actually an amazing shot considering it was a covered patio and yet the ball hit the very top right corner of the window. It had to be absolutely screaming as it came through there. The thought of this really shook me. Had that been a foot lower and it hit the lady in the head, she would have been killed. I’m 100% positive of it. I left them both my home and cell numbers and told them to get the window fixed and send me the bill. Had I been thinking on my feet I’d have told them my name was Matt and given them his phone number… ahh well.

From that point on, the rest of the day was shitty. I think I hit houses on the next 5 holes. Maybe more. On one of the holes, there is about a 1% chance that I could figure out a way to hit a house. but, a duffed shot that hit a rock and the ball took an amazing 90 degree right hand turn.. well, looks like I found a way after all…

More proof that people suck

For most people, seeing panhandlers on the side of the road is nothing new. You pull up to the stop light and there is some dude walking between the car with a “Please Help Out of Work Vet.” Most of the panhandlers that I’ve seen look like they are passing time between being drunk or wacked out on the drug of the day. I rarely roll down my window and toss change their way. Mainly because I feel that any money I give them is only going to go towards a bottle of booze or go into their veins. If I felt that they were going to use the money to buy food or to do something in the way of getting their life back in order, I’d feel much more compelled to throw a few bucks their way. When I see a panhandler outside a fast food joint that I’m driving through, I have been known to purchase an extra burger and fries, have it bagged separately and deliver the meal to the person rather than giving them the cash. This way I know that they are going to use the donation as it was intended. Keep that in mind… “As Intended.” I’ll get back to this in a few minutes.

I feel bad for all the people who had to experience Hurricane Katrina. Many lost their lives or lost friends or family. Many lost their homes and/or businesses. It was horrible even watching the chaos of it all safely from my living room. And, as always, it wasn’t long before all the benefits start rolling around. Benefit concerts, auctions, telethons, etc… Whatever the process is, tons of money goes to FEMA and then they distribute aide to victims of the Hurricane. The intention being to get these people back on their feet. I don’t think I have ever sent money in to a telethon myself and I don’t think I’ve ever won an auction for this type of charitable organization. When I read articles like this one I found on CNN.com, I don’t think I ever will. As it turns out, about $1 billion dollars worth of the aide money was spent on hookers and blow. OK, not hookers & blow exactly, but $600 at a strip club, $400 on “adult erotica products” etc, etc… Here’s a nice little snippet from the article:

Among other problems found with the registrations, according to the GAO study:

# People signed up for assistance using Social Security numbers that didn’t exist or belonged to other people.

# Aid applications contained bogus addresses for damaged property, or gave addresses for damaged property where the applicants did not live when the hurricanes struck. In one case, FEMA paid nearly $2,360 to a man whose allegedly damaged property was in a cemetery.

# Payments were made to people who listed post office boxes as their damaged residences.

# People submitted duplicate registrations, which FEMA did not detect.

# More than 1,000 registrations used the names and Social Security numbers of prison inmates. According to the GAO, in one instance, FEMA paid $20,000 to a Louisiana prisoner who listed a post office box as his damaged property.

So, I’ll end this the way I started it… people suck.

Visitors, Beatles & Pools

All ya need is Love

As the summer months quickly approach, it’s time to start getting ready for onslaught of visitors we will undoubtedly have. If you don’t live in Vegas, you wouldn’t understand. I know we didn’t fully grasp the concept until we lived here for a while. But Damn, when you live here, there are always visitors during the summer.

This past weekend was the start for us. My buddy Dan was in from So. Cal. He had come in to meet up with his mom who lives in Arizona. The came out to take in a couple of shows and basically just hang out. They had tickets for the new Cirque Du Soleil show going on at the Mirage. It’s called Love and it’s set to the music of the Beatles. The show isn’t officially “open” yet. They are still doing their preview performances. But, a quick check of the website and I found that there were still some really good tickets to be had. As luck would have it, we ended up sitting 4 rows directly in front of Dan and his folks. The music was great, the stage is awesome and the show overall was really enjoyable. My one complaint with the Cirque shows as of late has been the fact that there are fewer acrobatics than that of the show “O” and Mystere. They put more emphasis on the dancing & music. I’m not complaining, really, but I’d come out of the show saying that I absolutely loved the show if there was more acrobatics. As it was, I enjoyed the show, but, it’s no match for “O” or Mystere in my book.

Earlier in the day on Saturday, we went to a home show over at Cashmen Center. We are interested in installing a pool in the backyard and wanted to go check out some of the builders. I’m really glad we did. We got brochures from several vendors and one of them really took his time with us letting us know all that they offered plus a list of things we would want/need to know before moving forward. I couldn’t have been happier with his service, help and information. I hope it works out that we can use his company when it comes time to get the ball rolling.

While we were at the show we picked up a Little Giant ladder. You’ve probably seen their infomercial. It is one awesome ladder. As a home owner, I think buying one of these suckers is just about mandatory. We did have a bit of an adventure getting it home. We bought one of the demo models from the show and saved a little extra cash over the regular show discount. We went back to pick it up in the SSR on Sunday afternoon and found that it was about 4 inches too long to fit in the back of my truck. I ended up borrowing some bungie cords from the ladder salesman and driving home with the back gate down. We made it home safely and didn’t lose anything out the back so that was cool.

On Sunday, at the recommendation of Myya, we hit up the Sunset Station Brunch buffet at The Feast. It was an absolute hit! Since they have redone the buffet over there, it is all-around better than it was before. They had a great selection and I think I sampled just about everything they had to offer. The carved roast was my least favorite part and it was the part I was expecting to like the best… Ahh well, just about everything else there made up for it.

The DVD player in our living room died a week or two back. I’ve been wanting to pick up a new one but just haven’t really had the time. Sunday afternoon after dropping Dan off at the airport, Chris, Blake and I set off to pick up a new DVD player and some dinner. First stop, Best Buy (of course). I found exactly what I was looking for. 5 DVD changer + HD upsampling all for about $135. I’ll take it! Nope. They were out of stock. So, we hop back in the car and head over to Target. They were out of the same model but I found something comparable… they were out of those, too. By this time we are getting quite hungry. However, I plead for a quick trip to Circuit City. Pay dirt! We found the same player we had found over at Best Buy for the same price and they had some in stock. After a quick trip to Chipotle for some dinner, we headed home. I quickly downed my dinner and set out to install the new DVD player… One minor issue… it’s too deep to fit in our entertainment system. Ugg. We had recently purchased a stand that was to be used for keeping the video games in a semi-orderly fashion. I hadn’t put it together yet, but this seemed like a perfect opportunity. I slapped it together and the DVD player fit perfectly on the bottom shelf. A quick test to make sure everything was working smoothly. Then, instead of actually watching a movie, I went to the garage and installed my new Sirius Satellite radio receiver in the SSR. My old one bit the dust a few weeks back and it’s been killing me not being able to listen to Howard Stern on the way to and from work. By the time I was done with that install & activation, I was too tired to sit through any sort of movie. Ahh well, there’s always tomorrow night… nope, that’s poker night. I guess I’ll shoot for Wednesday. crap.

Car dealership annoyance

I’ve had my SSR for a little more than a year now. It runs great. Looks great. Excellent on gas milage… ok, I may have made that last part up…

Two weeks ago on my way in to work the door handle on the inside driver’s side broke. It didn’t come off or anything, but, it did stop performing it’s function of opening my door. I called the service department at the dealership where I leased the car and explained what the situation was. They set me up with an appointment for this morning. On my way in to work I had my buddy meet me at the dealership. While I’m inside meeting with the technician I explain again what the trouble is. He says to me, “Ahh. There is a bulletin going around about that. We’ve replaced several already.”

Midway through the day I called to see what the status was. If my car would be ready today or if it was going to be until tomorrow before I could pick it up. The technician explains that he doesn’t have the parts to fix it and has called around and nobody has the parts. He has to order them. It’s going to take 1 to 2 weeks to arrive. I tell him that I’ll come pick up my car and I hang up the phone.

As I sat at work bummed that my car was going to be injured for another couple weeks, something dawned on me. Why is it that they didn’t make sure they had the parts for my repair before I showed up for my appointment? Now, I know what you are saying, how could he know what parts he needed before you bring in the car? Well, I have an answer for that. He said that there is a bulletin going around about the issue I’m having and that he’s replaced several already. To me that means that they have a pretty good guess as to what parts are going to be needed. Hey, here’s an idea… if there is a bulletin going around about a specific issue with a specific model of car, how about making sure you have a few of those parts on hand over the next few months when it is most likely that people are going to be finding out about the problem and coming in to have theirs repaired?

I’m lucky it’s only my door handle. If it was some part that rendered the car undriveable, I guess I’d be shit out of luck.